Personal Training
Chicken Soup with Cabbage and Apples
It was 4 degrees in Boston yesterday. Yep, a balmy 4 degrees. I walked from my car to the grocery store and had trouble feeling my fingers once inside. I have never been a winter person and have lived on the East coast my whole life–go figure. Now, while I am not a big fan of the winter time, one thing that I am a HUGE fan of is soup. Soup, stews, chili’s…you name it…if it is served hot in a bowl and can warm me up–I am all for it. Recently I made a sweet and sour cabbage soup which was so unique and turned out much better than I had ever imagined.
I’m going to cut right to the chase because you should go make this soup now; or at least bookmark it now so you never forget it.
The new Cookinglight Magazine was packed with all new, quick and easy chicken dishes which made me very excited because I am ALWAYS on the lookout for new ways to make chicken interesting. And then I came across this soup
I took that recipe and attacked it.
This soup is a twist on traditional chicken soup-which we all know screams comfort as it is. This chicken soup was packed with cabbage, caraway seeds (the seeds that give rye bread that delicious taste) and sweet granny smith apple slices. I was so intrigued from reading the ingredients list. It also called for shredded chicken and I got lazy
So I picked one up at Whole Foods. What a beauty
I started by getting all of the vegetables chopped and prepared so I could just throw as I go. Here we have the celery and carrot. The recipe calls for 1/2 cup of each, but to be honest, I never measure and I am sure I had more than 1/2 cup.
Into the pot went garlic cloves (minced) the onions, carrot and celery. I let these vegetables cook down for about 6 minutes
Caraway seeds on the left and fennel seeds on the left. These spices together make for such an amazing flavor. Caraway seeds are the seeds that are found in rye bread. Fennel has that licorice/anise flavor and the caraway seeds basically taste like the flavor of rye bread.
After simmering the spices with the vegetables, the vegetable broth was added along with the sweet potatoes. I let all of the ingredients come to a boil (with the cover on)
After a 10 minute boil, the apples, cabbage, apple cider vinegar and shredded chicken were added in. The Granny Smith apples cook right down and leave such a natural sweetness to the soup
Chicken Soup With Cabbage and Apples from Cookinglight Magazine (February 2012)
Yields: 4 servings
Ingredients:
- 2 t caraway seeds
- 1/2 t fennel seeds
- 1 T olive oil
- 1 1/2 C chopped onion
- 1/2 C chopped carrot
- 1/2 C chopped celery
- 3 garlic cloves, minced
- 4 oz
chicken apple sausage, slicedI used 4oz more shredded chicken - 5 cups low sodium
chicken brothI used low sodium vegetable broth 8 oz chopped Yukon gold potatoesI used 8 oz sweet potato- 3 cup thinly sliced green cabbage
- 2 cups cooked chicken breast (about 8 oz)
- 2 C thinly sliced Granny Smith apples
- 1 T apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 t Kosher salt
- 1/4 t black pepper
Directions
- Heat olive oil over medium heat.
Add caraway seeds and fennel. Cook 2 minutes. Place in spice grinder, process until ground.(I skipped this step and didn’t ‘process’ the spices) I just added them to the one pot all at once - Heat oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add onion, carrot, celery, and garlic. Cook until softened (about 6 minutes) add spices and cook 30 seconds longer, stirring constantly
- Add chicken or vegetable broth and diced potatoes. Reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes. Increase heat to medium-high. Add cabbage and remaining ingredients (apple, chicken, vinegar, salt, pepper) Cook for 3 minutes (I kept it simmering for about 45 minutes)
- Serve and enjoy!
Are you looking for a more ‘hearty’ stew?
Do you have a favorite soup or chili/stew?
